5E Homebrew: Telegraphed Legendary Attacks

[zeebashew]

Big thanks to Pete, Elliot and Forrest for workshopping some of these ideas with me after our last session!
Additional ideas:
Maybe they can charge the action more times for more damage?
Maybe they are vulnerable to certain damage types while they are charging?
Maybe they have multi stage attacks, where each stage has a specific AOE?
Maybe they move as part of the big attack?

Also almost definitely: They shouldn't move once they start charging unless they cancel it, and they should be able to use their action in place of a legendary action to launch a charged attack.

[tuckerlambert-clark]

I really like this honestly it allows players to actually move around and protect each other also most legendary actions are boring but this is a fun spin to them

[Ziegrif]

One of my proudest moment was having a boss that used 8th and 7-9th lvl magic but had it on a wind up. It started casting at round start, then at round end it would cast whatever it was doing. The players could break its concentration, but when concentration was broken it would on the next turn use focus to protect its concentration for a turn. There were also suicide clowns approaching the group that would then fireball themselves if they got close enough.

The finale was the boss focusing on a meteor swarm and with enough damage the boss was taken down and the swarm launched into random directions. Good times, was stressful to the players.

[skrumbleton]

Dude, I was just literally thinking about telegraphed boss attacks for a campaign I’m going to run and just using legendary actions is such a great way to simplify it without making it less grand, can’t believe I didn’t think of it.

[bennettbottero]

I ran a one on one Zelda RPG using 5e for my fiancé and this is how I ran boss monsters. Each attack had a telegraphed wind up followed by an attack. Each attack had a way you could avoid it or straight up interrupt it to negate it altogether. It worked really well! And I’ve started using it for other actually dnd monsters as well!

[TomiNight]

A DM of mine has been running telegraphed attacks as 'paragon actions', telegraph happens at start of round, and event resolves at the end. This could be anything from an attack to an environmental change.

I loved it and will be using it in future games.

[pztgst]

I've been doing this for years. My favorite flavor is combining a boss telegraph with a lair telegraph. The lair telegraphs at initiative 20 and executes at initiative 1 and has bigger AOEs like hitting half the room or a starburst from a point. The boss then does a line or cone which limits the safe space and maybe leaves behind a puddle for them to stand in and take damage later.

[Zedrinbot]

I've run telegraphs in a game before. The problem I see with this one is that, whoever has their turn after the wind up is suddenly relegated to rescue duty, and it kinda feels bad for them unless they explicitly were planning to do that, or if they have a means to rescue someone without cutting into their own actions.

From my experience, you want to make sure telegraphs don't stifle the boss's action economy, and the players can deal with the mechanics and actually have a chance to react if they'll be the ones affected. When I did it, it was in PF2 (so opportunity attacks weren't a concern), and I created two types of telegraphs:
One, at the end of the boss's turn, it would switch weapons with a declaration. At the start of its next turn, it would get a free area of effect attack off, based on the weapon it equipped. E.g., a sword might be a spin attack to cleave everything adjacent, a scythe might cleave everything greater than 10-15 ft away (forcing you to get close), or a spear might just do a wide line AOE targeting the last person to successfully hit it. These go off immediately, before it can move, so it can't cheese things. It took players a minute to realize the AOEs were related to the weapon the boss had, but once they did, they were dancing around a lot more readily.
The other thing it would do sometimes is summon some pylons. Before the boss's next turn, they'd fire off attacks in a cross-line pattern for automatic damage. Players would know to move to the sides / out of the way. You can do something similar with say, environmental elements like cannons or geysers that the boss can activate to erupt or fire.

This worked out really well and kept players moving a lot. You just gotta be careful about throwing too many effects in at once, otherwise you can sometimes make a scenario where there are no safe areas, or they're impossible to feasibly reach.

[jevanking]

Great idea, can help make the players move around more and find new angles to attack and stop constant flanking

[jeightee]

I'd probably introduce this mechanic by having a creature without legendary actions spend its turn winding up a hit for the next round.

That way, when a bigger monster *uses a legendary action* to mimic such behavior, it should cause the players to recognize that and, hopefully, put 2 and 2 together regarding the legendary actions.

[minaly]

Ive already planned on doing this with dragon breath weapons. Each time the dragon regains their charge of breath weapon, make it very evident that the dragon is taking a deep breath, and is facing one specific direction (either one specifically annoying character or randomly rolled with dice), giving the impression that anyone in that same direction should probably skedadle or at the very least employ the dodge action. This is also very important to allow players to utilise protective spells and resources, because what happens too often in DnD is that you cast protection from energy but either the enemy just doesn't hit you (either missing or focusing on someone else), you shielded the wrong type of energy, or spent the spell slot on a fireball that is more rewarding in general.

[minmusmun]

I've thought of using telegraphed mechanics similar to this, but it never occured to me to use legendary actions for the wind-up and resolution. This is ingenious.

I will definitively be trying this mechanic in the next session. If the players respond well to it, I will be incorporating it into my boss fights from now on.

Love this idea so much.

[kent]

Our DM used FFXIV style telegraphed AoEs as the layer actions for the final boss fight of one of our campaigns. It added an extra layer of movement strategy instead of just the normal run up and deal big damage. It was one of the most unique fights I have ever had in D&D and it was a lot of fun! I highly recommend.

[soupurse]

I love doing this! Combined with locational and limb damage impacting big monsters (severed limbs, blinding, etc), it allows for a lot more nuanced combat and evolving strategies, as well as great opportunities for storytelling and roleplay beyond "the monster is hurt." I definitely don't recommend doing this with more than 3 monsters at a tine since you still have a game to run, but certainly wherever you can manage. Also, great video as always <3

[MeterLP]

I recently used the Fleecemane Lion from the Theros book, a CR3 creature with legendary actions. I loved it! Legendary actions shouldnt be limited to high CR monsters, because they improve the flow of bossfights at every level. If your players are going to fight a single, strong monster, try giving it one or two legendary actions!
That way it feels like a dynamic bossfight instead of the party stomping a helpless creature for 10 minutes until its the things turn again.
Make sure to balance it, though. If your bossmonster has multiattack, just use one of those attacks later as a legendary action. Or give the monster legendary actions that dont deal damage, but interact with players, like an Ogre picking up the fighter and tossing them at the wizard to throw both prone.

[abouttime]

Reminds me of spells like Moonbeam that trigger at the start of the creature’s turn. Lead to fun “GET DOWN” moments to save the party’s doppelgänger from being revealed.

[DungeonMiser]

I like this. I like it more if very occasionally the telegraph refers to one or two lesser used aoe attacks with a slightly altered style to remove some of the repetitiveness.

[zweihawke]

Been doing this in my campaign for a year-ish now. I love this mechanic so much as it makes spacing very important and prevalent especially in boss encounters. Spread the word!

[hobosorcerer]

I absolutely love this! As an old souls player, this is a great way to run large aoe spells. Using other area control abilities, like a wall of fire, can help the BBEG make this more threatening.

[RegularBard]

"This would destroy the table"

Yes, I think perhaps it would! My players would totally try it anyway though 😂